


These Broken Wings

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Traveling Man [42]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 11:16:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14851713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: Written for the comment_fic prompt: "Stargate Multiverse, Any, meeting your soulmate on another planet."Bucky Barnes meets his soulmate - on another planet.Post-Infinity Wars.





	These Broken Wings

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Brumeier](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Tell Me How To Feel (About You Now)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14816204) by [SherlockianSyndromes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherlockianSyndromes/pseuds/SherlockianSyndromes). 



Bucky wasn’t dead. He was also solid, although the sensation of totally disintegrating had been beyond horrifying. Every time he’d been put in the Chair as the Winter Soldier, he’d felt a little more of himself, of  _ Bucky _ wash away permanently, but to feel his  _ body _ dissolve was -

But he was okay now. Well, not  _ okay _ so much as whole and stranded in some kind of dark dimension or something. The surface was rocky, rough, with little ground cover despite the heavy forest canopy overhead. He tried his radio, but there was no response. Either his radio was dead or the others were out of range or -

Bucky was a soldier. A survivor. He climbed the nearest tree, broke the canopy.

The stars were totally unfamiliar. He’d learned to navigate by the stars as a matter of survival as a soldier, should he ever lose his compass. The night sky was nothing he’d ever seen before, especially the part where there were three moons in various stages of their lunar cycles, one a blade-thin crescent, the other a milky white half moon with massive craters, one full and pale pink.

Wherever Bucky was, he was far, far away from the others.

And then he heard a strange sound, a kind of  _ kawoosh, _ like rushing water. He ducked back down under the canopy, scanned his surroundings, but he couldn’t see the source of the sound.

Then he heard footsteps and voices.

“What are we looking for again?” a man asked.

Another man said, “You know, the crystal.”

They were Thanos’s troops.

Bucky growled under his breath, scanning for them. Judging by their voices, they were near.

“His Supreme Overlordliness was very specific,” a third man said. “We need these crystals so our power requirements can be met.”

They were looking for more infinity stones. Bucky had to stop them.

He crouched on the bough, tense, ready to spring, and watched four men pass below him in single file. They wore dark uniforms, tac vests, and carried what looked like Earth-style military assault rifles. They all also looked mostly human, with military-regulation haircuts.

“Don’t refer to him so disrespectfully,” one of the men said. “So - scanners out. Split up. Meet back at the gate in four hours. Check-ins every twenty minutes.”

“Yes, sir,” the other men said, and peeled away from him.

Taking the leader was the best strategic move - Bucky could get the most information out of him, and the leader would be a more valuable hostage. So he waited till the others’ footsteps faded. He dropped silently out of the tree, crept up behind the other man - who was looking at some kind of fancy alien scanner - and grabbed him.

He locked the man’s arms to his sides, clamped another hand over the man’s mouth so he couldn’t sound the alarm.

“You’re coming with me,” Bucky said, and he dragged the man into the trees.

He pinned the man up against a tree, one arm across his throat, trapping the man’s arms against his chest, too close for the man to throw a knee. It would have been intimate if Bucky’s intent hadn’t been violent.

“Where is Thanos?” Bucky asked. “How many stones does he have?”

The man blinked at him. He looked completely human - blue eyes, straight narrow nose, thin-lipped, wide mouth.

“I don’t know who Thanos is or how many stones he has,” the man said. “I think you have me mixed up with someone else.”

“You’re looking for crystals.” Bucky leaned in, bringing his weight to bear across the man’s collarbones.

The man winced. “Yeah. For ZPMs.”

“What’s a ZPM?”

“Ah - the Ancient word for them is  _ potentia, _ I think. They’re - power generators. For Ancient technology.” The man peered at him. “You look familiar. Have we - have we met before?”

His tone was calm, even. He was trying to talk Bucky down. This wasn’t his first encounter with someone hostile to him. It had been surprisingly easy to overpower him, now that Bucky thought about it. 

“No,” Bucky said. “We’ve never met.”

“But I know your face. I never forget a face.” The man peered at him. “You’re a dead ringer for Sergeant Barnes of the 107th. I remember, from high school history - you were Captain Rogers’s best friend. He was an artist, and I - but that’s neither here nor there. Can you ease up a bit? I promise I don’t know Thanos or about any of his stones. And that sounded kind of wrong.”

Bucky stared at him. “You’re from Earth.” And then he felt it. The burn on the inside of his wrist where his own soulmark was, followed by a flare of heat at the top of his spine, just below where most t-shirt collars covered, where his soulmate’s mark was.

The other man looked surprised. “Yes. You’ve heard of Earth?”

_ “I’m _ from Earth,” Bucky said.

“What are you doing all the way out here?” the man asked.

“I - we were fighting Thanos. I thought I’d died, but instead of dying I ended up...here.”

“Who’s Thanos?”

“He attacked Earth.”

“What? But - we haven’t heard from Earth since - since the last databurst last week.” The man started to struggle. “Let me go. I have to get back to the gate, notify Atlantis -”

“Who are you?” Bucky demanded. His heart pounded, and his pulse roared in his ears. Impossible. How could this strange man be his soulmate? This man he’d never have met if he’d never been made into the Winter Soldier.

“Major Evan Lorne, United States Air Force.”

Bucky eased back a fraction, took his weight off of Major Lorne so he wasn’t hurting the man anymore.

“Who are you?” Major Lorne asked.

“Bucky Barnes. United States Army. 107th.”

“I thought you were dead.” Major Lorne’s eyes went wide.

“People thought the same thing about Steve Rogers.”

“Touché.” Major Lorne shifted, and Bucky eased up further. “Look, Sergeant Barnes, I don’t know how you got here, but - you’re in the Pegasus Galaxy on an uninhabited planet. If Earth is under attack, I need to notify my superiors so we can send help.”

Bucky finally stepped back all the way, let Major Lorne straighten up and step away from the tree.

“I’m going to radio my team, all right?”

Bucky nodded.

Major Lorne tapped his radio with his left hand. “Alpha Romeo Three, this is Alpha Romeo Three-niner. Change of plans. Rendezvous at the gate ASAP.” He dipped his chin, listened to responses. “Roger that. Lorne out.” To Bucky he said, “Come on.”

He turned and led Bucky through the trees and to a clearing where there was a giant metal ring up on a raised platform with steps leading to it, and in front of it some kind of mushroom-shaped pedestal.

Bucky took a deep breath. Then he pushed back his right sleeve and held his arm out so Major Lorne could see the inside of his wrist, the severed left angel’s wing, blood dripping from the wound, white feathers blood-spattered. His soulmark.

Major Lorne stared. Then, with shaking hands, he pushed back his left sleeve and held out his wrist so Bucky could see the matching mark.

“Evan Lorne,” Bucky said softly. Invoking his soulmate’s name triggered the bonding process.

Evan flinched, and then he pushed back his right sleeve, held out his other arm, wrists together so Bucky could see both marks side by side. The right half of a shield attached to a right wing, almost like the kind for Army and Navy aviators but not quite the same. Instead of white and blood spatters, the shield and wing were all the colors of the rainbow, almost iridescent. Side by side, they looked like a pair of mismatched wings. When Evan tilted his wrists just so, they met up, formed a complete pair.

“Sir,” a man said, and Evan spun away from Bucky, though he still looked a little dazed.

Bucky turned and saw Evan’s three other teammates standing at the tree line, their posture casual but their hands on their weapons.

“You make a new friend, sir?” one of the other men asked.

“Something like that,” Evan said faintly. He reached out, pressed buttons on the pedestal, seven of them. They lit up, and Bucky saw corresponding symbols on the giant metal ring light up as well.

“We have to get back to Atlantis and warn them - Earth is under attack.”

“Attack, sir?” the third man asked, alarmed. “Is it the Wraith? Or the Lucian Alliance? Or the Goa’uld?”

Evan looked at Bucky.

Bucky said, “His name is Thanos. And he can undo the universe.”

There was a sudden, loud rushing sound, like the roar of ocean waves. Light swirled in the middle of the ring, coalesced into water. And then it just floated there, an impossibly vertical pool.

Evan fished a device out of his pocket, tapped at it.

“IDC sent,” he said. “Coughlin, Billick, Reed, I got your six. Go.”

They nodded and then walked  _ into _ the water. And vanished. Didn’t come out the other side. 

Evan tapped his radio. “Atlantis, this is Lorne. As soon as we’re through, dial up the SGC. We have an emergency.” Then he started toward the shimmering water.

Bucky hesitated.

“Come on,” Evan said. “It won’t hurt you.”

Bucky had been hurt so many times before. But he followed Evan anyway.

Evan was his soulmate.

For one moment Bucky was cold, and then he was weightless, like when he’d started to dissolve, only it didn’t hurt, wasn’t terrible.

And then he was  _ himself _ again, stepping into a room with a tall ceiling, armed soldiers gathered all around a ring just like the one he’d gone through. Some kind of portal, then.

Evan emerged behind him.

“Major Lorne,” a bald, bespectacled man called out. He stood on a balcony overlooking the room with the giant ring. “What’s the emergency?”

Bucky said, “Earth is under attack.”

“From who?” the bald man asked.

What did Evan and his people do, that they believed multiple people or entities could be attacking Earth?

“His name is Thanos,” Bucky said, “and he wants to wipe out half of us.”

“Us?” the bald man echoed.

“Half of all the life in the universe.”

The bald man said, “Dial the SGC.”

Bucky had delivered his message. Could he get back to Earth? He had to help Steve and the others. He turned to Evan. Evan was a trained airman, like Rhodey and Sam. He could help in the fight. They could fight together.

They could -

Evan said, “Bucky, what’s going on?”

Bucky turned and watched, horrified, as Evan dissolved right before his eyes. Screams rose as other people started dissolving all around the room.

“Not getting a lock, sir,” another man said, voice trembling.

Bucky lunged for Evan, tried to catch him, but Evan was  _ gone. _

*

Evan opened his eyes.

He was - he was in some kind of cell. Crammed in with a bunch of other soldiers. Soldiers in uniforms that looked like they were from WWII, maybe older. 

“Bucky?” he asked. The last thing he remembered was standing in the gate room, having just met his impossible soulmate.

“Hey, Barnes, some guy is asking for you,” someone in another cell said.

Evan pushed himself up, looked around, peered through the bars of his cell. He was in one of many cells, all crammed full of what looked like Allied soldiers. From WWII. Between the haircuts and mustaches and uniforms -

“Who’s asking?” Bucky said.

Evan pulled himself upright, saw Bucky leaning against the bars two cells down.

“Bucky,” Evan said, “it’s me.” He pushed back his right sleeve - and he was wearing an old-fashioned uniform himself somehow - and bared his soulmark. “Do you recognize this?”

Bucky peered. “Recognize what?”

One of the soldiers in the cell adjacent grabbed Evan’s arm, peered at his mark. “Your missing wing, Barnes.”

Bucky straightened up. “What’s your name?”

“Evan. Evan Lorne.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the incredible [SherlockianSyndromes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherlockianSyndromes/pseuds/SherlockianSyndromes) for letting me play in her universe and helping me come up with the soulmarks.


End file.
